June 2007/5

Proposed start-up Leinster Group Ltd has refused to acknowledge defeat but the prospect of a launch on the Lloyd’s platform looks bleak after the Society rejected its application.

AmWINS Group, Inc, the private equity backed-US wholesale broker linked with a move for London market broker Besso Group, has bought The American Equity Underwriters, Inc, (AEU) and refinanced its debt to fund further “strategic acquisitions”.

Capita CMGL is set to complete the reinsurance-to-close (RITC) transfer of the run-off Duncanson & Holt Syndicate 55 with capital supplied by CarVal Investors LLC, a fund backed by the agribusiness giant Cargill.

Brit Insurance Holdings plc’s $200mn cat bond is the second publicly rated collateralised debt obligation of natural catastrophe risk, following Catlin’s debut Bay Haven Ltd transaction last September.

Andrew Carrier, active underwriter of Kiln Ltd’s catastrophe Syndicate 557 and the reinsurance division of its Syndicate 510, is quitting the Lloyd’s insurer.

Hiscox plc has acquired the Illinois based livestock insurer American Live Stock Insurance Co in a deal that will provide the group with further US growth opportunities.

Banking giant HSBC Holdings has formed a joint venture with the UK’s largest insurer, Aviva, to sell general insurance products in the domestic market.

Lloyd’s (re)insurance broker, Newman Martin and Buchan Ltd (NMB), has become the latest intermediary to launch a capital markets division, which will be headed by alternative risk transfer veteran Mark Burbidge and senior reinsurance player, Paul Dunster.

Administrators PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) announced today a final payment of 76.75 percent to creditors under the Trinity Insurance Company Ltd scheme of arrangement.

Swiss (re)insurer Zurich Financial Services Group (ZFS) announced the establishment of a new division for its direct business in Europe effective 1 July, with a subsequent internal management re-shuffle.

The board of Fairfax Financial Holdings controlled reinsurer Odyssey Re has authorised a share buyback programme, the company announced.

CastlePoint Insurance Company, the US subsidiary of Bermudian (re)insurer, Castlepoint Holdings Ltd announced a risk sharing agreement with a Florida-based workers’ compensation and commercial auto specialist, AequiCap Insurance Company and its subsidiary